tamarastefans I live in Oregon so I was interested in this movie. To bad it went on and on and never ended. It almost starts to go somewhere, it even heads in a direction, but much like the wagon train, it is hopelessly lost. This movie is terrible. It confirms why I never trust the critic's reviews on movies. Only film students and someone obsessed with wagon trains should be forced to watch this film

jormatuominen This is a powerful little film about faith and the lack of it. It is somewhat thinly disguised as a historical western. Although quite poetic in it's expression it is firmly anchored in true historical events. As far as westerns are concerned, director Reichardt certainly breaks all the rules. John Ford and Howard Hawks wouldn't like Meek 's Cutoff, but Ford would understand from the opening scene what it 's all about. It's about people of faith, the pilgrims traveling to the west with no clue about their surroundings, destination let alone destiny, pressing on against the odds pretty much on faith alone.It is a film about leadership crisis. The hired guide of the small wagon train he leads, Stephen Meek, is unsure in a landscape which has dried up since his last visit. He tries to hide his self-doubts by bragging about his past exploits but only makes things worse. The pilgrims begin to see him as a liar and a cheat. Is it a good idea to follow him deeper into the desert or should they turn back to the regular Oregon trail? As water supplies diminish the question becomes one of life and death and inevitably starts to divide the settlers.Here is a film where the characters pray a lot, read the Bible all the time and face temptations and doubts in the desert. Yet none of the reviews here I have read mention religion at all. Really no bells ringing? When the settlers capture a native American who has tracked them, they face the question of what to do with their fellow man. Will they succumb to prejudice or do the Christian thing? Yes it is a film about Christian values as well.Some reviewers complain about lack of character development. Maybe they saw a different film. Michelle Williams convinces as Mrs. Tetherow, a young wife who begins to find her voice to openly challenge Mr. Meek and his set of values. When Meek loses it and intends to kill the Indian prisoner, the viewer will be surprised to see her counter move. "I'd be careful" is a line of hers from that powerful scene that stays in my mind at least. In a film of very sparse dialogue Michelle Williams manages to communicate her thoughts with looks and expressions, great directing and acting here and I would say a lot of character development.The films changes after the capture of the Indian with even more Christian motifs and leadership challenges. Should the settlers follow the unreliable and unsympathetic Mr. Meek or the unknown Indian who doesn't speak their language but knows the land, and should they listen to a woman? Everyone, the native included, now has a lot more to fear in this alien wilderness. Oh yes, this is a film about fear, real fear of unpleasant death hanging very close.I find it very difficult to understand why so many reviewers complain so much about the abrupt ending of the film. Well I was surprised, too. Having never heard of the Meek cutoff I too expected to see what finally happened to the lost wagon train. After all, for once I was watching a western that could end in disaster, death by starvation or native attack, settlers killing the guide, guide killing the settlers, a happy end... anything. Instead you got the end credits all of a sudden! The hints in the final scenes gave some clues. The settlers seemed to have found at least the beginning of the end of the trail. But to make sure I simply looked it up after the film (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meek_Cutoff). After all, I can read. Hey, it is not a secret what happened to the wagon train, to Meek and even to the Indian after the events of the film. Yes, in real life! The film follows, limitations of a small budget withstanding, those historical events fairly faithfully after all. However, I would not look the events up before seeing the film, as history contains spoilers in this case. Some people have seen all this and yet they feel nothing happened in the film. I am sorry but I have to disagree. I was on the edge of my seat a lot and enjoyed it a lot. Few films have a sense of time and place like this. So it's slow, but if a film tells the story of folks walking with their wagons through a highland desert and the timing is realistically right the film just has to be slow. Just adapt to it, after all you are sitting comfortably and have nothing to complain about compared to the people in the desert.

harrison-jfondren I said it all in my summary. Unfortunately, I have to write ten lines of text to have a bona fide review. That's more lines than the characters had in the movie. I'm sure walking to Oregon was really boring. At least the director brought that out in the movie. You have to give him credit for doing it in a creative way. I'd rather walk to Oregon than watch this movie again. While I was a bit annoyed that it just ended without any resolution, in retrospect, I'm just glad it ended. If only that Indian had put the settlers out of their misery at the end. At least then it would have had an interesting ending. I mean, an ending.

SnoopyStyle It's 1845 Oregon. Three families Tetherows (Michelle Williams, Will Patton), Gatelys (Zoe Kazan, Paul Dano), and Whites (Shirley Henderson, Neal Huff, Tommy Nelson) are led by the mountain man Stephen Meek (Bruce Greenwood) who claims to know a short cut across a high plain desert. They struggle as their water supplies dwindle. When the group captures an Indian, the group is torn about what to do with him.This is a slow pace movie with long uncut scenes. The style is minimalist. Kelly Reichardt is usually an indie director. That's what this is. It's nine actors and a crew out in the wilderness making a western indie. This is like a waking dream where we are waiting for something dire to happen. The acting is mostly reserved with a steady quiet tone. However I must object to the ending, and rate the movie lower because of it. It is not a proper ending.